Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
Environ Health Perspect. 2022 Nov;130(11):116002. doi: 10.1289/EHP10808. Epub 2022 Nov 11.
The Minamata Convention on Mercury (Article 4) prohibits the manufacture, import, or export of skin-lightening products containing mercury concentrations above . However, there is a lack of knowledge surrounding the global prevalence of mercury-added skin-lightening products.
The objective of this study was to increase our understanding of worldwide human mercury exposure from skin-lightening products.
A systematic search of peer-reviewed scientific literature was performed for relevant articles in four databases (PubMed, Web of Science Core Collection, Scopus, and TOXLINE). The search strategy, eligibility criteria, and data-extraction methods were established . The search identified 2,303 unique scientific articles, of which 41 were ultimately deemed eligible for inclusion after iterative screens at the title, abstract, and whole-text levels. To facilitate data extraction and synthesis, all papers were organized according to four data groups ) "Mercury in products," ) "Usage of products," ) "Human biomarkers of exposure," and ) "Health impacts."
This review was based on data contained in 41 peer-reviewed scientific papers from 22 countries worldwide published between 2000 and 2022. In total, we captured mercury concentration values from 787 skin-lightening product samples [overall pooled central median mercury level was ; interquartile range (IQR): 0.02-5.9] and 1,042 human biomarker measurements from 863 individuals. We also synthesized usage information from 3,898 individuals and self-reported health impacts associated with using mercury-added products from 832 individuals.
This review suggests that mercury widely exists as an active ingredient in many skin-lightening products worldwide and that users are at risk of variable and often high exposures. These synthesized findings identify data gaps and help increase our understanding of the health risks associated with the use of these products. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP10808.
《水俣公约》（第 4 条）禁止制造、进口或出口含汞浓度高于 . 的美白产品。然而，对于全球含汞美白产品的流行情况，我们的了解还很有限。
本研究旨在增进我们对美白产品导致的全球人类汞暴露的认识。
我们在四个数据库（PubMed、Web of Science 核心合集、Scopus 和 TOXLINE）中进行了系统的同行评议科学文献检索，以查找相关文章。我们制定了检索策略、纳入标准和数据提取方法。检索共确定了 2303 篇独特的科学文章，经过标题、摘要和全文层面的迭代筛选，最终有 41 篇文章被认为符合纳入标准。为便于数据提取和综合，所有文章均根据四个数据组进行组织：“产品中的汞”“产品的使用情况”“人体暴露生物标志物”和“健康影响”。
本综述基于 2000 年至 2022 年期间在全球 22 个国家发表的 41 篇同行评议科学论文中的数据。我们共收集了 787 份美白产品样本中的汞浓度值[总体集中中位数汞水平为. ；四分位距（IQR）：0.02-5.9]和 863 名个体的 1042 项人体生物标志物测量值。我们还综合了 3898 名个体的使用信息和 832 名个体报告的与使用含汞产品相关的健康影响。
本综述表明，汞广泛存在于全球许多美白产品中作为活性成分，使用者面临着不同程度且往往很高的汞暴露风险。这些综合研究结果确定了数据空白，并帮助增进我们对使用这些产品相关健康风险的认识。https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP10808.
